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OVERVIEW ARTICLE
Part One:
A Moment of Truth THIS PAGE
Part Two: The Challenge
Part Three: The Process
Part Four: The
Outcomes
Thinking With Nature: Today's Rendezvous with Destiny.
Michael
J. Cohen, Ed.D.
Part One: A Moment of Truth
As we begin to learn about reconnecting with nature, we begin
to discover why the world works beautifully, yet often it does
not work that way in our lives.
During my 37 years living, learning and teaching in natural
areas year-round, through the basic
element
I have identified cohesive energies in nature that creatively
hold the natural world together in balance. You have experienced
them. They touch you when you take a walk in an attractive natural
area and you feel rejuvenated by the magic of sunshine, trees
and the wind. In nature, these attraction energies have no name,
for nature has no verbal language. However, we, and all of life,
are born with the ability to feel, enjoy and benefit from them.
We sense them as natural attractions through 53 different senses
we inherit from nature. Our problem is that, unlike how nature
works, our excessively indoor ways teach us to make sense of
our lives mainly using five of these natural senses, not all
of them. The disastrous personal, social and environmental results
speak for themselves. Scientifically, I demonstrate that our
problems subside as we learn to make conscious sensory contact
with nature and learn to think in multisensory ways. That process
is a practical applied ecopsychology.
Research shows that we can choose to rejuvenate and use all
our 53 natural senses and reverse our excessively destructive
ways personally and globally. However, be alarmed. I recently
watched these natural senses perform their magic before the eyes
of informed, caring people. They, like most of us, were insensitive
to the value of the performance. They chose to ignore it. Their,
and our, dismissal of it is cause for great concern.
The performance occurred at a hurried, stressful training session
for community leaders. Their differences kept them arguing amongst
themselves. In the midst of this hubbub, a young, wild bird flew
into the meeting room through the open door. It could not find
its way out. Without a word, the behind-schedule meeting screeched
to a halt. In that moment, the bird brought to people's consciousness
deep natural attractions and feelings for its life. Hope filled
each person. For ten minutes that frightened, desperate little
bird catalyzed those seventy people to harmoniously, supportively,
organize and unify with each other to help it find its way back
home unharmed. Yet when they accomplished this feat, these leaders
cheered the accomplishment and their role, not the bird's. It's
role and impact went unnoticed. They returned to the hubbub of
the meeting, as if nothing special had happened.
I wanted to point out to this group the powerful, sensitive,
unifying and mutually supportive effect the bird had upon them
individually and collectively. Experience told me they would
scoff, as they had previously. They would say what happened was
not important or useful for it was uncommon to have a wild bird
touch their lives.
Unconsciously, these leaders sensitivities allowed a touch of
nature's plight (a bird at risk) to unite them, to free them
from the stress they were feeling and catalyze community amongst
them. Although it said not a word, the bird was an educator and
counselor. It reached and ignited people's inborn nature, nurturing
senses of love, empathy, community, friendship, power, humility,
place, reasoning and a score of others. A bird brought joy, cohesiveness
and integrity to their lives. The benefits were evident. I have
found that it is the lack of such contact that creates and sustains
our runaway disorders.
The bird impacted the conference because, as part of nature,
it was part of everybody at the conference. Humanity is to nature
as our leg is to our body. We are one, an integrity that is sentiently
integrated. For example, as we breathe Earth, Earth breathes
us. One need only hold their breath to realize that our desire
to breathe is a specific natural sense, a love for air. We did
not invent that love. It is of, by and from nature. We inherit
it and many other attraction sensitivities from nature. The bird
reconnected us with nature. It sparked some of our natural sensations
and feelings into consciousness and things came out right. Anybody
can learn to create similar experiences that afford similar outcomes.
However, this seldom interests us. We have learned that to expressively
emote, enjoy and validate nature is similar to having an illicit
affair.
Our lives don't make sense and our problems flourish because
industrial society does not teach us to seek, honor and culture
nature's sensory contributions to our lives. We learn instead
to conquer nature, to separate from and deny the time tested
love, intelligence and balance enjoyed by the natural world.
CONTINUE TO Part Two:
The Challenge
What you can do:
The Orientation
Course, below, responds to 32 critical
life relationship questions. They are answered by enabling you
to enjoy and then share online ten authentic, sensory, Nature
connected attraction experiences over a 12 day to 5-week period.
Sign the Earth
Day Petition for Peace on Earth
Through Peace With Earth and put to use the Earth
Day Activity
THE BEST WAY TO ENJOY AND TEACH SELF-EVIDENT
ATTRACTION EXPERIENCES IS THE NATURAL
SYSTEMS THINKING PROCESS:
ORIENTATION COURSE: Psychological
Elements of Global Citizenship
The
Science of Connecting With the Web of Life
The Art of Thinking With Nature
An exciting, inexpensive ($35) blend of shared, online
activity, information and training with credit optional. Learn by doing. Become a practitioner
anywhere. This is a free course
if it meets your needs, a transferable prerequisite for additional
courses, degrees
and participation. The course is our best, most complete and
useful way to help nature restore the good nature of humanity
in contemporary society. It opens new vistas in academics, counseling,
careers, spirit and wellness, vistas that recycle and purify
destructive thinking. Optional Credit $42.00
READ AND TEACH THIS ANTIDOTE FOR
APATHY
Einstein's
World: Natural Attractions, Intelligences and
Sanity A non-fiction, metaphor, book and reading course.
It helps you reverse nature disconnection disorders from your
home. You can take it, teach it and be paid, too. Book $15.00,
Course $20.00. Optional Credit $42.00
EXPLORE THE PROCESS
FREE: Our Exploratory
Course online enables you to sample
the Natural Systems Thinking Process to learn, first hand, its
thrust and benefits.
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INSTITUTE OF GLOBAL
EDUCATION
Special NGO consultant United
Nations Economic and Social Council
PROJECT NATURECONNECT
Readily available online
tools for the health of person, planet and spirit
P.O. Box 1605 Friday Harbor, WA 98250 360-378-6313
www.ecopsych.com
APPLIED ECOPSYCHOLOGY IN ACTION
The Natural Systems Thinking
Process
Dr.
Michael J. Cohen, Director
send email
nature@interisland.net
Nature Connected Education and Counseling
Courses and Degrees Online
Too often we suffer and feel helpless
because the deterioration of humanity and the environment hurts
us and we are unaware of its cause.
Research demonstrates that the stress arising from our
extreme sensory separation from our nurturing origins in Nature
underlies most of our unsolvable personal, social, and global
problems.
In a democracy, to reach our hopes and
dreams the knowledge we discover must be accompanied by a readily
available educational process that motivates and enables
the public to apply the knowledge.
With respect to our destructive disconnection
from nature, the web page links, below, empower you to use and
teach an effective rehabilitating process that will help you
improve most settings and relationships.
.
Experience first hand
the benefits of the process via our Orientation
Course
.
PLEASE NOTE:
All links to
http://www.pacificrim.net/~nature/-name-.html
have been moved to
http://www.ecopsych.com/-name-.html.
If a pacificrim page link is not working,
kindly change its domain address
from
pacificrim.net
to
ecopsych.com
.
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